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Authentication

Medium Converter can access articles behind Medium's paywall by using authentication cookies from your browser.

Browser Cookies

By default, Medium Converter attempts to extract cookies from your browser to authenticate requests to Medium. This allows you to access articles that would normally require a Medium membership if you're already logged in.

Supported Browsers

Medium Converter supports extracting cookies from the following browsers:

  • Chrome/Chromium
  • Firefox
  • Safari (macOS only)
  • Edge
  • Opera
  • Brave

Using Browser Cookies

Command Line

# Enabled by default
medium convert https://medium.com/example-article

# Explicitly enable
medium convert https://medium.com/example-article --use-cookies

# Disable
medium convert https://medium.com/example-article --no-cookies

Python API

from medium_converter import convert_article

# Enabled by default
await convert_article(
    url="https://medium.com/example-article",
    output_format="markdown"
)

# Explicitly enable
await convert_article(
    url="https://medium.com/example-article",
    output_format="markdown",
    use_cookies=True
)

# Disable
await convert_article(
    url="https://medium.com/example-article",
    output_format="markdown",
    use_cookies=False
)

If automatic cookie extraction doesn't work, you can manually specify cookies:

Environment Variables

export MEDIUM_SID=your_sid_cookie
export MEDIUM_UID=your_uid_cookie

Configuration File

In ~/.medium-converter/config.toml:

[auth]
sid = "your_sid_cookie"
uid = "your_uid_cookie"

Python API

from medium_converter import convert_article
from medium_converter.core.auth import get_medium_cookies

# Create a custom cookie dictionary
cookies = {
    "sid": "your_sid_cookie",
    "uid": "your_uid_cookie"
}

await convert_article(
    url="https://medium.com/example-article",
    output_format="markdown",
    cookies=cookies
)

Finding Your Cookies Manually

If you need to manually find your Medium cookies:

  1. Log in to Medium in your browser
  2. Open DevTools (F12 or Right-click > Inspect)
  3. Go to the Application tab (Chrome) or Storage tab (Firefox)
  4. Select Cookies in the left sidebar
  5. Select the medium.com domain
  6. Look for sid and uid cookies

Limitations

  • Cookie authentication only works if you have an active Medium membership
  • Cookies expire after a certain period (usually a few weeks)
  • Some browsers store cookies in an encrypted format that may not be accessible
  • Corporate security policies might prevent accessing cookies